Nicholasville, Ky. – Jaron Kohari never thought that his path to sobriety would involve horses.
The 1,000 -pound animals disconnected it upon arrival at a farm outside Lexington that teaches the ridges to the addicts, with the prospects of a work and a future if cleaned. But in a short time they were making him feel happy, the same emotion that he used to pursue with alcohol and drugs.
“You are not used to taking care of anything,” said Kohari, a former 36 -year -old underground coal miner from Kentucky. “You are a bit selfish and these horses require your attention 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, so it teaches you to love something and take care of it.”
Frank Taylor’s idea for the stable recovery program was born six years ago due to help in the 1,100 acres farm of his family that has failed and raised some of the largest stars of the races in the heart of the country of Kentucky Horse.
The area is also the home of the United States Bourbon industry and races have long associated with alcohol.
“If a horse won, I drank a lot,” Taylor said. “If a horse lost, I drank a lot.”
He believes that his own consumption had contributed to the alcoholism of a close family member. He left and said he has been sober for five years.
The basic framework for the program at Taylor Made Farm came from a restaurant that frequents whose owner operates it as a second chance employment opportunity for people in recovery. Taylor thought that something similar would work on his farm, given the physical work involved in the care of horses and the peaceful atmosphere.
Taylor only had to convince his three brothers.
“It is a fairly radical idea because we are dealing with horses of one million dollars and many clients of one million dollars and say: ‘Hey, I want to bring some alcoholics, some criminals, some heroin addicts, some addicts to methamphetamine, whatever it is.’ There was a list of things that could go wrong,” he recalled.
The response of your brothers?
“Frank, we believe you are crazy.”
He reminded them that the farm mission statement includes living Christian values while attending customers and obtains profits. They agreed to let him try for 90 days, with the promise that he would close it if something went wrong.
“I wouldn’t say that it has gone perfectly, but it has been much better than bad,” Taylor said. “The industry has really accepted it, the community around Lexington and throughout the country has really accepted it, and we have had fantastic results.”
Taylor said that 110 men have successfully completed the program, which requires participants to be sober before starting.
Financed by donations, stable recovery does not advertise. The racing industry colleagues get in touch with Taylor on possible participants. The houses and judges of sobriety in the area also refer to men, with the program offered as an alternative to jail.
It does not charge its participants until they begin to earn money once they start working on the farm.
At that time, they pay $ 100 per week for food, housing, clothing and transport. They earn $ 10 per hour the first 90 days, then get an increase at $ 15 to $ 17 per hour.
The objective is to keep men in the program for a year instead of other recovery programs that are executed for 30, 60 or 90 days.
That allows ties to form between the group, make up trust and give men time to rebuild their lives and relationships with their families.
But for each success story, there are some that do not last.
“They come here and think they are ready and that they are not really ready,” Taylor said. “They do not have a gift of despair where they have to change and have hit the background and have to be willing to do many small things that are aggravating and challenging.”
That includes ascending at 4:30 am, cleaning your room, keeping impeccable public areas. There are anonymous alcoholic meetings at 6 am and working hours are executed from 7 am to 4 pm, four days a week. Life on the farm implies preparing horses, getting them out of their stalls and entering daily pastures, veterinarians and horseshoes, and farm maintenance.
The other days men attend therapy outside the site or visit doctors in an effort to build their sobriety. Stable Recovery is associated with an outpatient treatment program that provides classes and therapists and both parties maintain constant communication.
At night, men turn to do dinner for the group and then turn off the lights at 9 pm
They are always awaiting horses, their big dark eyes looking from their positions. Animals are barometers how their human handlers feel every day.
“I think the horse is the most therapeutic animal in the world,” Taylor said. “There are other animals such as dogs that are very good, but there is something on a horse, like Winston Churchill said: ‘The exterior of a horse is good for the interior of a man'”.
The newcomers often have nothing to be proud and are tired of being judged by their families, their communities and the legal system. They are depressed, anxious, sometimes suicidal.
“Being close to a horse at the beginning of recovery is a manufacturer of difference,” said Christian Countzler, CEO and co -founder of stable recovery that said he overcame his own addictions to alcohol and drugs.
“A few days after being in a barn around a horse, he’s smiling, he is laughing, he is interacting with his teammates. A guy who literally couldn’t lift his head and look in the eye is already better,” he said.
Kohari said he had been entering and leaving the treatment since he was 18, failing on numerous occasions to kick the alcohol and then heroin, fentanyl and methamphetamine, before coming to Taylor, the farm.
“I was broken,” Kohari said. “I just wanted something different and the day I arrived in this barn and began to work with the horses, I felt that they were healing my soul.”
After completing the program, he worked at Winstar Farm before returning to Taylor Made Farm as coordinator for a barn full of pregnant mares.
Stable recovery helps men get a job in the industry after 90 days when they graduate from their riding school. Participants do not have to work in the industry, but most want.
Among other successful graduates are the children of two veterans of the racing industry.
Blane Servis, an alcoholic in recovery, is an assistant coach of Brad Cox in Kentucky. Servis’ Father, John, Trained 2004 Kentucky Derby and preakness winner Smarty Jones.
Walden beat a 12 -year -old heroine addiction to become a coach. His father, Elliott Walden, is president and CEO of Winstar Farm racing operations. He previously trained the Galope Victory for a victory in Belmont’s bets of 1998.
Once the young Walden, Tyler Maxwell and Mike Lowery had cleaned, they asked Taylor to find someone to buy 10 horses so they could train them.
Unable to convince anyone, Taylor was convinced of that. Bought 10 horses at $ 40,000 each.
“I tell my wife and she is ready to kill me,” he said.
The bet increased by placing another $ 400,000 to take care of the horses and hire Walden and the other men to train, leaving Taylor on the hook for $ 800,000.
His wife was still upset, so he found others to buy for $ 200,000.
“We lost approximately half of our money,” Taylor said, “but from that, all those guys remained sober and today Will Walden has 50 horses in training.”
Walden’s stable earned $ 4.2 million last year.
His foal, the rightly called Bless The Broken, recently finished third in the $ 1 million Kentucky Oaks In Churchill Downs.
Maxwell is an exercise pilot at the Winstar Farm training center. Lowery is the divisional breeding manager in Taylor made.
“We are looking to put these sober guys,” Taylor said, “and then you can get them in places to work where they can advance in the industry and we are seeing that happens daily.”
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